JUNE BOOK

Our book for June is The Power of the Dog by American novelist Thomas Savage (link), just recently made into an Oscar nominated film by noted director Jane Campion.  We'll be back in Gastown again on the Steamworks Brew Pub patio (Steamworks), kitty corner to Waterfront Station.  Enjoy a pleasant pre-summer evening of book banter and beer on Tuesday, June 7.  It's the usual 7pm start time with all and sundry welcome to join.

Set in the wide-open spaces of the American West, The Power of the Dog is a stunning story of domestic tyranny, brutal masculinity, and thrilling defiance from one of the most powerful and distinctive voices in American literature. The novel tells the story of two brothers — one magnetic but cruel, the other gentle and quiet — and of the mother and son whose arrival on the brothers' ranch shatters an already tenuous peace. From the novel's startling first paragraph to its very last word, Thomas Savage's voice — and the intense passion of his characters — holds readers in thrall.

MAY BOOK

Our book for May is Napoleon: A Political Life by French history scholar Steven Englund (link).  We'll be trying a different venue this month, namely Steamworks Brew Pub (Steamworks), located just a half block east of Waterfront Station.  Join the Gastown gang on the Steamworks patio this Tuesday evening, May 3.  As usual, it's a 7pm start and all are welcome.

This sophisticated and masterful biography brings new and remarkable analysis to the study of modern history's most famous general and statesman. As Englund charts Napoleon's dramatic rise and fall―from his Corsican boyhood, his French education, his astonishing military victories and no less astonishing acts of reform as First Consul (1799–1804) to his controversial record as Emperor and, finally, to his exile and death―he explores the unprecedented power Napoleon maintains over the popular imagination.